Mortifying meaning : To discipline (one's body, appetites etc.) by suppressing desires; to practise abstinence on. (usually used passively) To embarrass, to humiliate. To injure one's dignity. To kill. To reduce the potency of; to nullify; to deaden, neutralize. To kill off (living tissue etc.); to make necrotic. To affect with vexation, chagrin, or humiliation; to humble; to depress. To grant in mortmain. To lose vitality. To gangrene. To be subdued. Mortification; abstinence Causing mortification; extremely embarrassing.